Just Bento

I know I'm new at this - but I have a bento challenge up on my blog! Check it out!
http://www.bentomadness.com/2010/04/challenge-and-two-bentos.html

I am going to apologize in advance for my truly novice questions. I have looked at some of your blogs and I am officially intimidated. I am just starting and have a lot to learn. My question is that I see so many bentos using molded rice as one of the main ingredients.

My questions are:

What is your sushi rice recipe (I've always made it adding just a little rice wine vinegar)?

Are you using sushi rice for kids' bentos? And if so, what age, are they eating it, and how do you deal with heating it up (or do you) when other parts of the bento should remain cold? continue reading...

Hello,

I'm a college student and I live alone. I normally cook only for myself. After making several bento boxes, I realize that since bento is like having a little bit of this and a little bit of that, I need to stock up many ingredients in my fridge. Items like eggs pose no problems, but the problem comes when I need vegetables. I can't buy just a tiny piece of vegetables from groceries store, so normally I end up with rotten vegetables in my fridge because I can't make use of them before they go bad. continue reading...

Hello,
I got a bottle of grape juice syrup as a present a while ago. I've used it as pancake topping and with ice cream etc but have been recently wondering if it could be used as an ingredient for any dishes or perhaps pickles? The syrup is not very thick, it's quite liquid in fact.
I'm going to experiment with it and see what I can cook up, but any ideas are welcome!

In February Mark Bittman - NYTimes, Minimalist featured this recipe:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/03/dining/03mini.html?ref=dining
I have prepared it several times, quite like it, and think that it is going to be part of my rotation.
Might not be 'authentic' as Bittman freely admits.

I'm sorry if this is in the wrong place, but I was just wondering if anyone could tell me what happened to my favorites. I know that the site separated justbento and justhungry favorites, but I think I lost a lot of my favorited pages on both sites. For example, I know I had several bento numbers favorited, but now I only have a few. Recipes like Maki's miso-walnut paste are gone. For some recipes, it's oaky because I use them so much that they're easy to find, but I can't remember everything I had in my favorites, and so I might be missing something I had wanted to try before.
Any ideas? continue reading...

(From the forums…what’s on your bento staple list? - maki)

Hello & hate to pop back in after so long.

So I’ve FINALLY found the right opportunity to start bento-ing. I’ll be living in dorms next year, but it’ll be an apartment set up, so i’ll have my own freaking kitchen to cook.

So I was wondering if I could get suggestions on a staple list that I can acquire at your basic grocery store. continue reading...

I'm concerned about the health of a dear person in my life. When I met him he ate a lot of fast food, like many college students. Now he's mostly living on canned soups and frozen curries, which are an improvement, but I'm sure you can see why I'm concerned. He knows how to cook well enough to follow any recipe and says he rather enjoys it, but all my efforts to get him to cook a healthy meal at least one day of the week have failed. continue reading...